Gower offered him no chance..

Entering Esslemont air, Fleetwood tossed his black mood to the winds.  She breathed it.  She was a mountain girl, and found it hard to forgive our lowlands.  She would learn tolerance, taking her flights at seasons.  The yacht, if she is anything of a sailor, may give her a taste of England’s pleasures.  She will have a special allowance for distribution among old Mr. Woodseer’s people.  As to the rest of the Countess of Fleetwood’s wishes, her family ranks with her husband’s in claims of any kind on him.  There would be—­she would require and had a right to demand—­say, a warm half-hour of explanations:  he knew the tone for them, and so little did he revolve it apprehensively, that his mind sprang beyond, to the hearing from her mouth of her not intending further to ‘guard her rooms.’  How quietly the words were spoken!  There was a charm in the retrospect of her mouth and manner.  One of the rare women who never pout or attitudinize, she could fling her glove gracefully—­one might add, capturingly under every aspect, she was a handsome belligerent.  The words he had to combat pleased his memory.  Some good friend, Lady Arpington probably, had instructed her in the art of dressing to match her colour.

Concerning himself, he made no stipulation, but he reflected on Lord Feltre’s likely estimate of her as a bit of a heathen.  And it might be to her advantage, were she and Feltre to have some conversations.  Whatever the faith, a faith should exist, for without the sentiment of religion, a woman, he says, is where she was when she left the gates of Eden.  A man is not much farther.  Feltre might have saved Ambrose Mallard.  He is, however, right in saying, that the woman with the sentiment of religion in her bosom is a box of holy incense distinguishing her from all other women.  Empty of it, she is devil’s bait.  At best, she is a creature who cannot overlook an injury, or must be exacting God knows what humiliations before she signs the treaty.

Informed at the house that her ladyship had been staying up on Croridge for the last two days, Fleetwood sent his hardest shot of the eyes at Gower.  Let her be absent:  it was equal to the first move of war, and absolved him from contemplated proposals to make amends.  But the enforced solitary companionship with this ruminator of a fellow set him asking whether the godless dog he had picked up by the wayside was not incarnate another of the sins he had to expiate.  Day after day, almost hourly, some new stroke fell on him.  Why?  Was he selected for persecution because he was wealthy?  The Fates were driving him in one direction, no doubt of that.